I need to be at the gym in 26 minutes...

I don't even own a tv.

Clicking that link just cost me $1.62, dammit.

Time is monkey.

"It prompts a mindset of maximizing the economic value of your time," study author Sanford DeVoe wrote in an e-mail. "Consequently, when this goal is obstructed, you feel your time is being unprofitably wasted causing you to feel more impatient."

Your time is worth the money you get paid while your working. The rest of your time? You're either giving it away by being salaried, or you have an overblown sense of self worth (example: equating your leisure time with an economic equivalent).

As someone who has worked off and on for an hourly wage in construction for the last 45 years, I tend to see it the other way 'round: for me, money is time. When I look at the cost of something, I see it in terms of how many hours I'll have to work to pay for it. At this point in my life, that calculation saves me from buying a lot of useless crap. Work 60 more days to buy a new truck versus spend time with the kids and the grandsons? Yeah, that's a tough call.

i'm glad they're using their time wisely now

Gough: As someone who has worked off and on for an hourly wage in construction for the last 45 years, I tend to see it the other way 'round: for me, money is time. When I look at the cost of something, I see it in terms of how many hours I'll have to work to pay for it. At this point in my life, that calculation saves me from buying a lot of useless crap. Work 60 more days to buy a new truck versus spend time with the kids and the grandsons? Yeah, that's a tough call.

Plus there's the opposite along a different direction, which is seeing that certain monetary savings aren't worth the time, effort, headache, and/or loss of dignity involved. For example, you can sell your old microwave on Craigslist for $50 and spend time fielding calls, answering emails, and meeting local weirdos who may or may not be casing your house when they come by; or you can just drop it off at the Salvation Army on the way home from work. Obviously everyone's schedules and financial situations vary, but I definitely know some financially comfortable people who still insist on doing the former just because they refuse to see the latter as anything other than setting fire to $50 in cash.

Bunny Ranch has a University now? I wonder what kind of classes they have.

kab
Your time is worth the money you get paid while your working.

This is right, but only in a limited sense. For example, we must assume that I can only ever work 8 hours for $10/hr each day (i.e. the company won't pay me for any more and I have no ability to make money outside of work). Most people will have some ability to earn money outside of a regular work day, but let's ignore that.

Even then, the amount of money that I spend is not restricted in the same way. I can spend $10 for someone to mow my lawn. Or I can take an hour to do it myself and save the $10. Here, an hour of work has left me with $10 that I would not have had otherwise. For purposes of comparison here, it's effectively the same thing as working an extra hour and earning $10.

The problem that the article discusses isn't really the result of being able to rationally compare value. It's the result of people undervaluing their own happiness (in terms of money).

Gough
I see it in terms of how many hours I'll have to work to pay for it.

This. Beyond a certain level of income, doing things I enjoy outweighs the money I could be making in that time.

kab: "It prompts a mindset of maximizing the economic value of your time," study author Sanford DeVoe wrote in an e-mail. "Consequently, when this goal is obstructed, you feel your time is being unprofitably wasted causing you to feel more impatient."

Your time is worth the money you get paid while your working. The rest of your time? You're either giving it away by being salaried, or you have an overblown sense of self worth (example: equating your leisure time with an economic equivalent).

What if you have the choice to work overtime and pay someone else to mow the lawn, change the oil, plumb, etc instead of spending twice as much time value of money doing it yourself?

Time is most definitely money, and it is up to the individual to determine if they'd rather work more or do something else.

Smackledorfer: What if you have the choice to work overtime and pay someone else to mow the lawn, change the oil, plumb, etc instead of spending twice as much time value of money doing it yourself?

If you're working while these tasks are being done, sure.

If you're putting a price on your free time and adhering to it, it's a fantastic way to burn through cash. One great example is working on your own car. If a fix is within your technical ability to complete, and the parts + tools are significantly less than what the bill would be to have a mechanic do it, I'd be hard pressed to bring it to the shop, because in that situation, I'm not going to include what I think my time is worth... I'm using my own time to get it done, thus getting the task done with as little cash outlay as possible.

Granted, there are exceptions to this rule (like, is it witch titty cold out? can I go x number of hours w/o a car? etc).

There's also the notion that some tasks you're better off completing yourself, because you might not look at it from a "how long is this going to take me" point of view, where a hired hand will definitely take that approach and possibly cut corners.

Just my take on things. I'm sure that someone who makes a good amount of coin, and also has a big family to care for has a very different approach to it.

I should have worded my original statement a bit differently. :)

kab: "It prompts a mindset of maximizing the economic value of your time," study author Sanford DeVoe wrote in an e-mail. "Consequently, when this goal is obstructed, you feel your time is being unprofitably wasted causing you to feel more impatient."

Sorry, I don't actually see a problem with this. But it's also about how you deal with it. "economic" doesn't mean money grabbing, it means making the best use of things.

I've seen people I know tweeting about how their Sky broadband has gone down, how they're having to deal with a shiatty Indian call centre who are farking robots and so forth. You'll never see me getting impatient like that, because I won't deal with companies like that. I'll pay an extra few pounds a month to know that I'll get an ISP for my business who I can call up, ask them to look into a problem or change something and who will either get it done in a few minutes or who will at least I know be endeavoring to get it done. And the reason is that I think about time and money. If I'm without internet, my work suffers. If I'm having to spend time on the phone to them, I'm not doing something else.

But likewise, I think about making best use of my leisure time and weighing that against cost. I don't do much DIY because frankly, it's not worth it. My local fireplace company quoted me £200 to fit a fireplace. I know a lot of people who would have said "£200, that's not worth it". Then they'd have had to buy any necessary tools, losing part of the saving, Then they'd have spent much longer than the pros fitting it because they don't do it first time, then running the risk of screwing it up (if the pros do it, they have to take the hit). You compare that to your time and it works out that you're earning less than the minimum wage, so you might as well spend the time with your kids. My uncle once spent a whole weekend fixing a digital camera. He got there in the end, but frankly, he could have replaced it for £50.

farkeruk: kab: "It prompts a mindset of maximizing the economic value of your time," study author Sanford DeVoe wrote in an e-mail. "Consequently, when this goal is obstructed, you feel your time is being unprofitably wasted causing you to feel more impatient."

Sorry, I don't actually see a problem with this. But it's also about how you deal with it. "economic" doesn't mean money grabbing, it means making the best use of things.

I've seen people I know tweeting about how their Sky broadband has gone down, how they're having to deal with a shiatty Indian call centre who are farking robots and so forth. You'll never see me getting impatient like that, because I won't deal with companies like that. I'll pay an extra few pounds a month to know that I'll get an ISP for my business who I can call up, ask them to look into a problem or change something and who will either get it done in a few minutes or who will at least I know be endeavoring to get it done. And the reason is that I think about time and money. If I'm without internet, my work suffers. If I'm having to spend time on the phone to them, I'm not doing something else.

But likewise, I think about making best use of my leisure time and weighing that against cost. I don't do much DIY because frankly, it's not worth it. My local fireplace company quoted me £200 to fit a fireplace. I know a lot of people who would have said "£200, that's not worth it". Then they'd have had to buy any necessary tools, losing part of the saving, Then they'd have spent much longer than the pros fitting it because they don't do it first time, then running the risk of screwing it up (if the pros do it, they have to take the hit). You compare that to your time and it works out that you're earning less than the minimum wage, so you might as well spend the time with your kids. My uncle once spent a whole weekend fixing a digital camera. He got there in the end, but frankly, he could have replaced it for £50.

That assumes that the economics of DIY are the only consideration. For a lot of us who do things ourselves, the money is a small part of it. The best part is learning how to make/fix things. Better yet, and we did this when the kids were young, make/fix stuff with the kids, so they learn how to do it as well.

In my work the hourly varies wildly. In a good hour I might do something worth $2000, in a bad hour I might spend more on gas than I'll profit.

When I get impatient it's because I'm trying to warp time to go from this current low-profit time to a different location that could make for a high profit time. Standing in line is low profit. Sitting in traffic is low profit. Waiting for that stupid biatch to write a check is low profit.

But when my sources are tapped or closed, I'm free. Actually, there is one more phase. When my sources are too much a pain in the ass to deal with because they're full of normal people.

kab: "It prompts a mindset of maximizing the economic value of your time," study author Sanford DeVoe wrote in an e-mail. "Consequently, when this goal is obstructed, you feel your time is being unprofitably wasted causing you to feel more impatient."

Your time is worth the money you get paid while your working. The rest of your time? You're either giving it away by being salaried, or you have an overblown sense of self worth (example: equating your leisure time with an economic equivalent).

You do not have a GED in economics.

Anything that makes more people act like dicks is good for the economy.

farkeruk:
But likewise, I think about making best use of my leisure time and weighing that against cost. I don't do much DIY because frankly, it's not worth it. My local fireplace company quoted me £200 to fit a fireplace. I know a lot of people who would have said "£200, that's not worth it".

yearg. Or blow up the house/kill everyone inside slowly because they farked the gas connection.

not killing everyone is generally worth at least £200 I think.

/probably gonna get a pro in to fit thermostats up with the combi boiler in the new house. Paying someone £75 for parts and 30 minutes labour is easier than taking 2 days to figure out how to do it correctly and then screwing it up.

thisone: Paying someone £75 for parts and 30 minutes labour is easier than taking 2 days to figure out how to do it correctly and then screwing it up.

Exactly.

One of the things about specialisation is that you make the gains by doing something repeatedly. IMO tiling is worth learning because you can apply it a number of times (I've done 4 tiling jobs in my life already). First time takes a long time, but 2nd time you do it quickly and by 3rd and 4th times you're only a bit slower than the pros.

Fitting a fireplace? I'm only going to do it once in my life.

Gough: As someone who has worked off and on for an hourly wage in construction for the last 45 years, I tend to see it the other way 'round: for me, money is time. When I look at the cost of something, I see it in terms of how many hours I'll have to work to pay for it.

I see it two ways

#1) The same as you (minus the kids/grandkids)

#2) The way the article describes, but in a far more draconian manner, in that being delayed is not only a waste of my time (which is a waste of money) but is also a waste of my life (a limited resource). Being able to work unlimited OT doesn't help this either, because wasted time literally is time I could be working, even outside of work hours.

Yankees Team Gynecologist : Plus there's the opposite along a different direction, which is seeing that certain monetary savings aren't worth the time, effort, headache, and/or loss of dignity involved. For example, you can sell your old microwave on Craigslist for $50 and spend time fielding calls,

I'm about to start dry cleaning nearly all of my shirts/slacks.

It's something I wouldn't have thought about doing when I was younger/poorer.

But now, I think about how long it would take me to wash/iron those shirts/slacks, vs how much it would cost to drop them off, get them dry cleaned, and pick them up.

And basically, It's not worth it for me to wash my own shirts/slacks now.

/next promotion, I'll probably be hiring a maid service.

/maybe I can hire a driver so that I can work on the laptop while being driven around.

You can spend all your time making money,
You can spend all your love making time...

Time is not money. Waiting in line for 15 minutes should not allot you 25% of your hourly pay unless your job involves waiting in line. I'm an impatient fark but anyone who thinks like this is obsessed with work and doesn't respect other people.

falkone32: I can spend $10 for someone to mow my lawn. Or I can take an hour to do it myself and save the $10. Here, an hour of work has left me with $10 that I would not have had otherwise. For purposes of comparison here, it's effectively the same thing as working an extra hour and earning $10.

In my case, I could telecommute and work an hour of OT and earn several times $10. So for me, it comes down to.

1) Mow my own lawn (save $10)

2) Pay someone to mow lawn (lose $10), and telecommute for an hour while they're mowing the lawn (earn 1 * $way_more_than_10).

/OTOH, I have gradually been replacing the shutoff valves in my condo. It was worth the time to learn it vs paying a plumber to replace them.